Oily Industry Impacts on the environmental vulnerability of the territories: case of Fuel Commercializing Company of Villa Clara, Cuba
Author(s): David Castro, Omar Gutiérrez, Jelvys Bermudez, José Poma; Bernardo Lopez, Micaela Demichela
More info: The production, storage and transportation of hydrocarbons involve risks of environmental polluti...on. The goal was to characterize the pollution by hydrocarbons, caused by the operations of the Fuel Commercializing Company of Villa Clara (ECCVC, in advanced), on the different environmental recipients. Four comprehensively geographical strata were established on the research area. It was monitored with 4 sample stations, the oily treatment system of the ECCVC over a period of 3 years. Furthermore, seven wells were selected to sample upstream and downstream the ECCVC. The results suggest the contamination with hydrocarbons in the recipients has been related with the management of oily residuals in the ECCVC. The inadequate design features of the lagoon and the lack of maintenance of the API separator were the main possible causes of the failure modes identified with high risk priority numbers. A management plan was designed. The results highlight the negative environmental impact caused by the ECCVC operations, acting as a permanent stressor on the territory, whereas contributing to increase the near community vulnerability against hydrocarbon pollution.
2020 | Book Section
Qfd to Determine Experimental Biopiles Requirements, to Be Used at Bench-scale as a Strategy Against Soil Pollution with Oily Waste
Author(s): David Javier Castro Rodriguez, Yudexi Jimenez Gonzalez, Omar Gutiérrez Benitez, Enmanuel Casals Pérez, Dayana Ribassa Ribassa, Orlando Viera Ribot, Micaela Demichela
More info: Due to the increase in the amount of oil used, large volumes of hydrocarbons are released annually into the environment, constituting one of the main causes of soil pollution worldwide. The Center for Environmental Studies of Cienfuegos, Cuba; implemented an experimental project to develop an innovative technique as a resilient alternative to this environmental problem. The objective was to implement the Quality Function Deployment (QFD), to determine the design requirements of the experimental units to be used at the bench scale, for the biodegradation of different biopile treatments. The QFD offered a systematic approach to translating attributes into engineering features. The concentrations of microorganisms, nutrients, and hydrocarbons in the biopile were the characteristics that accumulated more than 50 % of the relative weights of the first level matrix. The initial concentration of hydrocarbons and the percentages of moisture and bulking agents in the mixture obtained the highest relative weights in the second level. The percentage of bulking agents was identified as an opportunity to reduce costs and improve the effectiveness of bioremediation and stimulate the circular economy. The results enabled delineating the experimental protocols for the engineering design, which ensured to build the bench-scale prototype of the experimental units for the evaluation of various treatments of biopiles ecotechnology as a resilient alternative against soils hydrocarbon pollution.
2022 | Journal Articles
Post Un-Lock. From Territorial Vulnerabilities to Local Resilience
Author(s): Grazia Brunetta, Patrizia Lombardi, Angioletta Voghera
More info: This open access book builds a framework that holds together numerous open issues in territorial planning: from the understanding of territorial, landscape, environmental and climatic dynamics to the analysis of local vulnerabilities, to the use of modern survey techniques to support planning. What is the role of urban and regional planning in achieving the sustainable development goals of our communities considering the major issues posed by the COVID-19 pandemic in urban planning? And how do these medium- and long-term objectives interact with the needs that the emergency has given rise to? Post Un-Lock—from territorial vulnerabilities to local resilience—aims to provide the reader with a useful key to understand how the COVID-19 pandemic can be seen as a catalyst for a restart based on the concepts of sustainability and resilience. In fact, the COVID-19 experience evidences the need to propose a planning system able to integrate multiple scales according to an interdisciplinary approach focused on in-depth knowledge of the territorial risks and vulnerabilities. Besides, with the contribution of the new technologies, it is able to rethink spaces on a neighbourhood scale, conceived as a "local resilience unit" that ensures the population high standards of safety, liveability, and accessibility to proximity services. In this view, planning is increasingly concerned about social aspects and the well-being of communities, supported by indicators and evaluation tools. With the proposal of the concept of local resilience unit, Post Un-Lock takes a step forward towards the definition of a new paradigm of local planning and a topic for urban regeneration.
2023 | Book Editing
Mainstreaming Energetic Resilience by Morphological Assessment in Ordinary Land Use Planning. The Case Study of Moncalieri, Turin (Italy)
Author(s): Danial Mohabat Doost, Alessandra Buffa, Grazia Brunetta, Stefano Salata, Guglielmina Mutani
More info: Energetic resilience is seen as one of the most prominent fields of investigation in the upcoming years. The increasing efficiency of urban systems depends on the conversion of energetic production of buildings, and therefore, from the capacity of urban systems to be more rational in the use of renewable resources. Nevertheless, the integration of the energetic regulation into the ordinary urban planning documents is far from being reached in most of planning processes. In Italy, mainstreaming energetic resilience in ordinary land use planning appears particularly challenging, even in those Local Administrations that tried to implement the national legislation into Local Building Regulation. In this work, an empirical methodology to provide an overall assessment of the solar production capacity has been applied to selected indicators of urban morphology among the different land use parcel-zones, while implementing a geographic information system-based approach to the city of Moncalieri, Turin (Italy). Results demonstrate that, without exception, the current minimum energy levels required by law are generally much lower than the effective potential solar energy production that each land use parcel-zone could effectively produce. We concluded that local planning processes should update their land use plans to reach environmental sustainability targets, while at the same time the energetic resilience should be mainstreamed in urban planning by an in-depth analysis of the effective morphological constraints. These aspects may also represent a contribution to the international debates on energetic resilience and on the progressive inclusion of energy subjects in the land use planning process.
2020 | Journal Articles
Interferometric Satellite Data in Structural Health Monitoring: An Application to the Effects of the Construction of a Subway Line in the Urban Area of Rome
Author(s): Giulia Delo, Marco Civera, Erica Lenticchia, Gaetano Miraglia, Cecilia Surace, Rosario Ceravolo
More info: In recent years, the use of interferometric satellite data for Structural Health Monitoring has experienced a strong development. The urban environment confirms its fragility to adverse natural events, made even more severe by climate change. Hence, the need to carry out continuous monitoring of structures and artefacts appears increasingly urgent. Furthermore, satellite data could considerably increase the feasibility of traditional Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) approaches.This study aims to explore this remote sensing approach, focusing on the representation techniques that can be adopted to highlight their advantages and provide an interpretation of the results. In particular, the study analyzes records from the urban area of Rome (Italy), subject to the construction of a new subway line. These data are exploited to create a velocity map to highlight the possible subsidence phenomenon induced by excavations. Then, the paper focuses on single buildings or building complexes through the entropy–energy representation. Beyond the different limitations caused by the input data, a correlation is identified between the results of the two representation techniques. Accordingly, the effects of excavation on the urban area are demonstrated, and the methodologies are validated.
2022 | Journal Articles
Co-evolutionary, transformative, and economic resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic crisis. Evidence-based experiences of urban community design in Turin (Italy)
Author(s): Cristina Coscia, Angioletta Voghera
More info: This article seeks to interpret co-evolutionary and transformative resilience in a broad sense, with the aim of understanding how it may come into the practices of urban planning and project-making, innovating project procedures, and generating economic effects. This article studies this through the case of Bottom up!, the Turin-based Festival of Architecture, and observes the procedures through which resilience takes action in different territories, inter-preting territorial problems and crises such as the pandemic, viewing them as opportunities to innovate the system, suggesting integrated action on the natural, cultural, financial and social capital, experimenting with new practices, and holding institutions accountable.
2022 | Book Section